Cold Buttons
by M00
Summary: Something's bothering Spot, but can an unexpected visit from a little girl change his point of view?*finished*
1. Default Chapter

Disclaimer: I don't own Newsies. Or Spot. If I did he'd live in my closet. *Hugs Spot* Anyhoo.I do own Maddie (aww the cuteness!! *hugs Maddie too*) and Spots boots. They're really random. *Hugs Spot's boots* OK it's getting mighty crowded in here. Read, my children, read!  
  
Swedish. They told him his boots were Swedish. The gray-mustached man at the counter proclaimed them the "finest contribution to the world of footwear that could be imported at an unbelievably low price" as he straightened his vest with a smart little tweak. Not that any of that mattered. The rough cobblestones from the summer months scraped away at the seams, and now the snow's icy wetness seeped through the shredded holes. His feet were cold, and he was kicking snow up onto his pant legs as he walked. He hugged the brown, threadbare jacket closer to his body as he hunched his shoulders against the wind. Everything seemed darker in the winter. Lights burned low in the lampposts as he shuffled closer toward the place he called home. It was only at times like these, when he was alone, that he let his mind wander to the gaping emptiness inside him. Never around 'his boys' would he allow himself to become distracted or show weakness in any way. It was slowly becoming harder and harder to keep up the façade of a carefree, rough-and-tumble leader; to throw the doubts of the people who questioned his authority back into their faces. It was that feeling, knowing that he couldn't have control over everything he felt, that scared him more than anything. Control was not something he sacrificed freely. This vast longing for an unknown panacea was affecting his ability to think straight. When there was a lull in the activity, anywhere, anytime, a sudden sadness would tighten in his chest. Weakness, the thing that he hated most, was becoming part of him.  
  
He sighed and hoped the raging turmoil would pass as quickly as it had come. Glancing up into the heavens, he noticed that the clear blue sky was obscured by the never-ending journey of snow to the grimy cobblestones. Shadows of people, contented in their warm houses, moved back and forth in the dimming gaslight. Back down on the ground, he skirted around a broken crate frozen in a snowdrift. Upon exhaling, he watched as the now-visible tentacles of his breath intertwined with the cold night air. Cold. He was cold inside and out. Inwardly furious with himself for allowing weakness to strike him again, he scowled into the blackened night.  
  
"Pl-please.excuse me sir," squeaked an anxious voice behind him.  
  
Spot Conlon whirled around, daring the intruder upon his thoughts to speak again. It was a girl, who looked no older than six or seven. What did she think she was doing, interrupting someone's walk home? It was late and she should be asleep somewhere. Anywhere, he didn't care, as long as it was away from him  
  
"What?" he snapped irritably.  
  
The girl took several terrified steps backwards, looking horrified at the very sight of him. 'I.that is to say.I need to." her speech ended in a terrified squeak and she jumped back a few inches.  
  
Spots lips tightened. He didn't have patience for silly little girls. As he turned to walk away, the unbearable sadness once again clenched his heart in an unbearable death grip. He growled submissively and rounded on the girl. She was still standing where he had left her, looking as though she was frozen. A strange sensation was vibrating through him as he watched her shaking in her ugly brown dress and loosely woven cap. The flaps, although pulled low over her ears, didn't seem to be keeping the penetrating cold from reaching her ears. Her boots looked very much like his, he noticed, but with copper-tipped toes.  
  
Spot averted his gaze back to her very red cheeks. She looked as though she was holding her breath.  
  
"What's your name, girl?" he asked, simply because he couldn't think of another thing to say, and it seemed necessary to make conversation.  
  
Her lips moved, but no sound came out. Nearly out of patience, he ducked his head slightly. "Eh? Didn't catch that." His tight-lipped frown from earlier was creeping onto his face.  
  
"M-M-Maddie" she whispered in a barley audible voice. "I.would you.I." Her voice trailed off and she held up a handful of buttons that looked very much as though they has been torn off of her coat, which Spot noticed was flapping open in the wind. She shivered, looking terrified.  
  
Something about the way she looked at him struck Spot unexpectedly. Her eyes, maybe? Even though her red cheeks puffed out from breathing in the icy air, her big brown eyes seemed.warm, almost. Stranger still, the cold vice that the emptiness had fastened around his heart seemed lessened somehow.  
  
"Spot Conlon" he said suddenly, surprising the girl after his long silence. Come to think of it, he surprised himself.  
  
From the way her eyes widened, he could tell that she had heard of him. An irrational pride welled up inside him, as it always did when his name was recognized. His reputation was very important to him, but the euphoria in knowing that he was a household name was short lived. She looked nothing short of terrified.  
  
Sighing again, Spot reached into his pocked and pulled out a nickel. It was a lot, but.she didn't look as if she had a penny to her name. She was selling her buttons, for heaven's sake. He made up his mind and handed her the nickel before he backed out.  
  
"Here" he said gruffly, "Keep the button."  
  
Her windblown face lit up with a sudden joy that contrasted oddly with the dark, dreary Brooklyn streets. She seemed unable to put her thanks into words, but Spot suddenly found himself not needing to hear it. The sadness seemed to have been lessened slightly. Maybe...just maybe...this girl's unexpected intrusion was the cure to the unknown problem that he'd been struggling with for so long.  
  
"Take care of yourself, you hear?" he mumbled, turning on his heel to continue his journey back to the lodging house.  
  
The girl stood in the snow, silently elated, watching the figure disappear into the wintry shadows. The very boy who's name struck fear into the hearts of the toughest people she knew had just given her more money than she'd ever made in two days worth of selling. She smiled at the nickel in her frozen palm.  
  
"Spot Conlon" she whispered.  
  
A/N: awww! Spots such a cool dude!!! Oh and about his lack of accent.I have no idea how to type it, so I just left it plain. You seem like a creative bunch, just imagine it while you're reading. I'm thinking about adding a second chapter.tell me what you think. *Jumps up and down next to the review button waving pom poms* "Review! Review! And I'll love you! *Thinks for a moment* And Spot will too! Ok it's a lousy rhyme. Sue me. Actually don't, I have no money. You'd be wasting your time. Time that could be spent.oh...I don't know.reviewing?? tee hee 


	2. Chapter 2

"Money can't buy happiness, but poverty can't buy anything."- Chris Pearson  
  
A/N: This chapter is dedicated to my wonderful wonderful reviewers!! Kisses and love from Spot to them (and a special kiss from Race to Sapphy. He came to visit Spot in my closet, see. Spot got lonely; he was shooting marbles at my jeans)  
  
Disclaimer: I own only this computer. Actually my parents do, but whatever. I own Maddie, William, Helen, and company. If they weren't in the movie they're probably mine. Oh and the random newsies at the end but they're kind of unimportant. You can have them if you want. I'll put them up on E- Bay. (Which I also don't own. Silly lawyers.)  
  
A/N: I forgot - all the info on the way the mills run I got from the book Lyddie by Katherine Patterson. Sorry there aren't many newsies in this chapter, I needed it to explain Maddie and to finish the story. Don't despair, loyal Spot fans, His Hotness will make a comeback at the end. ^_^  
  
Helen slowly opened her eyes and stared out into the darkness of the small, cramped room. Instinctively, she rolled over on her side to check on her little sister, Maddie. Helen furrowed her brow as she surveyed the child. Her cheeks were red and she was huddled under the thin blanket on the bed they shared. A sudden panic overtook her. Did she have the fever? No, her cheeks felt.cold. She'd been out in the snow again, most likely trying to sell something. Helen sighed, angry with herself for hoping beyond hope that she'd managed to make a sale. Nothing was the same without Uncle Eugene. Not that the children had ever been close to him, but he had been their guardian ever since Father died. It seemed to Helen that no one ever stuck around on Earth long enough. Mother, weak by birth, had died a month after Maddie was born. Father went soon after, but no one was quite sure how. Many of the old widows in neighboring apartments insisted to each other in their gossip circles that he was too brokenhearted to live. Helen couldn't disprove this theory, no matter how much she wanted to. Those three months were a blur of confusion. At six years old, the subject of death is written off as a strange and mysterious absence. Helen silently counted on her fingers. It had been nearly six years since her parents' death. And almost 2 years next month since Uncle Eugene passed away. Sadness suddenly flooded Helen's heart and she closed her eyes, praying for sleep to come quickly.  
  
*  
  
"Helen, get up. You're going to be late."  
  
Yawning, Helen stretched her arms out to the ceiling as her sixteen-year- old brother William shook her awake.  
  
She smiled up at him as he adjusted the sling on his arm. William had been crippled since birth, making it nearly impossible for him to get a steady job. The fact that he, the oldest, couldn't support the family grated harshly on his conscience.  
  
William grinned back, his disability never taking away his optimism. "Get up, silly Nelly, you've slept late to-day!"  
  
Helen laughed at his use of a Maddie-ism; she liked very much to lord over the two of them. Looking around, Helen noticed that Maddie was awake and gnawing away at an old crust of bread. "Speak of the devil," she said, sitting up and fixing Maddie with the sternest look possible, "Someone snuck out again last night."  
  
Maddie dropped the stale bread in shock. "But I...I didn't mean to.I made a nickel!" she burst out suddenly.  
  
William looked upset and surprised at the same time. "A nickel? How did you make that much? What on earth were you selling?"  
  
Maddie looked guilty. In the form of a response, she got up, walked over to the roughly hewn wooden chair by the door, and picked up her coat. Helen stared at it. She'd sold her coat? No, that couldn't be it.maybe she'd tried to sell it. But where did the nickel come from?  
  
William gave a gasp of shock that, to Helen, didn't seem to fit the situation. "What?" she asked, feeling left out.  
  
"She's gone and sold her buttons! Maddie, how could you? You mean to tell me that you were wandering around the streets in the middle of the night with an open coat? It's freezing outside!"  
  
Maddie's brown eyes filled with tears. "I was hungry" she sniffed. "I just wanted to help, and I still have all the buttons." She ran to Helen and buried her face in the bed sheets.  
  
William looked upset and offended; the nickel lay forgotten in Maddie's coat pocket beside the buttons. "Maddie, listen to me. Helen has her job at the mills, and I've been looking for odd jobs to help us get by. You're too young to be wandering around the streets alone. Understand?"  
  
Maddie nodded, tears leaking from her eyes, and sniffed. Helen patted her head, and slid her legs over the edge of the creaky bed frame. It was time to get ready for work.  
  
*  
  
Outside the gates of the factory, Maddie stood gripping Helen's hand as they waited for the bell to ring. Helen smiled down at her, thinking that she should try to sew Maddie's buttons back on if there was a spare moment when the looms were running simultaneously. A sudden unanswered question was nagging at the back of her mind, and she crouched down to look in her sister's eyes.  
  
"Maddie?" she asked softly, "Where did you get the nickel? You still have all of your buttons, don't you?"  
  
To her surprise, Maddie's face broke in to a sunny smile. "Oh, that. Well, my friend gave it to me."  
  
Helen frowned. What friend? A girl from the factory? No, they were all paid the same and she certainly didn't have enough money to be handing out nickels left and right. Besides, Maddie didn't really know any of the girls; she worked as a doffer with the other young children, replacing the empty spools of thread with new ones for the older girls. "What friend, Maddie?"  
  
She smiled at Helen, looking proud of herself. 'Spot Conlon! He's my friend! He said I could keep my button and he gave me five cents."  
  
Helen leaned closer to her sister. "Wait a minute. Who is this Spot person? How do you know him?"  
  
One of the other girls in line with them, Mercy, turned to look at Helen as though she was crazy. "Spot Conlon? Don't tell me you've never heard of him."  
  
Helen frowned; she had never taken to this girl, whose sole existence seemed to be to butt into other people's business. She turned back to Maddie.  
  
"Who is this boy, how do you know him, and why did he give you a nickel?" (A/N: that sounded a lot like Davey asking Jack about Snyder at Medda's. I think I've seen this movie too many times)  
  
Maddie looked wearily up at Helen. "Silly Nelly, I told you, he's my friend. I offered to sell my buttons and he gave me the nickel because he's a nice person."  
  
A loud snort of laughter from Mercy made Helen jump. "Spot Conlon doesn't go around handing out nickels to button-sellers. He's the most respected and famous newsie in all of New York, and probably everywhere else. (A/N: ok I've definitely seen this movie too many times) And do you know why? Because he beats up anyone that rubs him then wrong way. You've never met him. You only heard the name and thought it made a good story." And with this, she turned on her heel and strode up to the front of the line with her nose in the air.  
  
Maddie looked tearfully up at Helen. "You believe me, don't you Nelly?"  
  
Helen stared doubtfully down at the child, but then shook herself mentally for letting Mercy's know-it-all attitude make her doubt the honesty of her sister. "Of course I believe you," she said loudly, hoping that Mercy would hear her. But at that moment, the bell rang and no one heard her but Maddie, who threw her little arms around Helen's neck. "He's my friend, he really is!" she said happily as the other factory girls began to push past them to get inside out of the snow.  
  
Helen stood up and smiled down at the dark brown curls that rested on her sister's head like a crown. Taking the little hand in her own, she walked into the factory, proud of her little 'working girl'.  
  
*  
  
Inside the stuffy, hot mill room, Helen made sure that her looms were working as they should, and stole the precious moment to slip outside for a breath of fresh air. The cold January wind was a shock to her overheated body, and she knew that she'd catch her death of cold like this, but it was such a relief to breathe air that was free of lint and dust! She quietly observed the people milling around in the street. A street sweeper tipped his hat to her as he passed, and a crowd of newsboys was sitting on and around a bench across the street. They were talking among themselves, but Helen noticed that one more was approaching the group. She was about to go back into the factory when a shout rang a bell in her head.  
  
"Conlon!" shouted a dark haired newsie to the one that was walking up to the group. He waved his gray hat to them.  
  
"Conlon" Helen murmured to herself. Conlon.Conlon.Spot Conlon! Maddie's 'friend', she knew that she recognized the surname. But who on earth named their child Spot?  
  
She was snapped out of her reverie by another, deeper voice saying " Didn't see you around the lodging house last night Conlon. You come in late?"  
  
The new boy answered "Yeah, out walkin' when I was done selling papes."  
  
The deep-voiced boy grinned at him "Date with a new girl, Conlon?"  
  
Spot grinned back at him, almost laughing. "Yeah, I guess you could call it that."  
  
Suddenly the dressmaker whose shop they were lounging around in front of burst out and began yelling. "Hey! No loitering on my property! Customers only!"  
  
The boys stood up from under the awning, grumbling and gathering up their papers. Helen could hear them hawking headlines and joking all the way down the street. Despite the bitter cold, she smiled as she watched the gray hat fade slowly into the bustle of the Brooklyn street.  
  
"Spot Conlon" she whispered.  
  
A/N: Never fear, Spot is here! Um.Epilogue - William is magically healed by Mush's evil twin Mush (uh.their mom wasn't feeling very creative at the moment) and he disguised himself as Pulitzer and takes over the world (the paper, not the planet). Helen and Maddie move to the World Office with him, and Helen finally gets to meet Spot. (No, they don't fall in love, he's like 5 years older than her). The real Pulitzer moves to South Dakota with the Horace Greeley statue ("Go West, Young Man") Spot has a huge birthday party and invites Chelsea (a wonderful reviewer), Helen, Maddie, William, and all the other newsie people. Mercy.is eaten by a very hungry Dutchy who mistakes her for a piece of cake. (Um.he forgot to wear his glasses) Ok I'm done. Review, my pretties, review!! *Cackles evilly and puts some more green paint on her face* 


	3. A note to the readers

A note to the readers: In response to the reviewers who asked if this story was going to go on, I don't think it is. It was originally a one-shot fic about Spot in a depressed mood and Maddie cheering him up, but then as I was writing it I thought it would be better to explain Maddie and her life more before the story ended. Reading it now I realize that I probably could have written it to be more chapters than two, but I'd have to re- write the whole thing and I don't really have the patience to do that. I'm not sure if I ended it well. The epilogue was really weird and random; I was in a hyper mood when I did that. (Combine that with leftover chocolate from my little brother's boy scout camping trip and you get Pulitzer moving west with statues and people eating antagonists.) Anyway, I'm glad you liked it, I've never written any fan fiction before and I was a little nervous about how it would go over. Oh, and someone asked how old Helen is. I re-read the part where I tried to explain that and you were right, it was confusing. She's supposed to be around twelve, she was six when her parents died and then she was counting that it had been six years since their death. I think that was one of those things that only makes sense to the author because I already knew what was going on, lol. Sorry about that. I'm probably gong to write more stories, and maybe I'll do something about Maddie's later life. Thank you to my wonderful reviewers, who encouraged me to write more when I thought I was done (and I wound up enjoying it). You guys rock!!!! -moo 


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